2013 Oregon Turkeython & Age Group Championship Recap & Results

Run Oregon readers Robin York & Jennifer Dodge Sapienza, gearing up for the 10k.

30° F, sunny skies, and the faintest of winds greeted 1,070 runners and walkers yesterday morning at the 2013 Oregon Turkeython and Age Group Championship, the third running of the largest turkey trot in the Portland Metro area. Thanksgiving also marked the first day of the Run Oregon Holiday Run Streak, where yours truly and all you readers at home who want to play along will be running at least a mile every day from Turkey to 2014.

But back to the race. As an individual completely reliant on public transit, I opted out of picking up my race packet on any of the three generous days of packet pick-up that were hosted by JC Penny in advance of race day. It was a gamble to skip advance packet pick-up, but two (pick-up + race day) 2.5 hour round-trip bus/MAX rides simply weren't in the cards for me this week. On race day-- Thanksgiving-- I boarded the blue line in early morning darkness and surveyed the other riders. Based on the sea of technical fabrics around me, at least a third of the other riders were also headed to a turkey trot in the city. Flash forward an hour and change, and I'd arrived at Washington Square in Tigard, Oregon.

Sisters Annie and Halie Footman of Canby, Ore. ran a 25:48 5k in ugly Christmas sweaters, wearing bibs that expressed their gratitude for each other.

Stepping out from my warm bus into literally freezing temperatures, I knew I would have to keep moving for the next half hour if I wanted to remain unfrozen. I jogged around the mall from the bus stop to the start line, where a large, white tent was set up for packet pick-up, race day registration, post-race food, photography, and the instant, post-race results that Uberthons is famous for. It was only a half hour before the race started, but I only had to wait behind one person to pick up my bib and chip. Good job, Uberthons--on top of three days of advance packet pick-up, they also had three lines for pick-up on race day itself.

As the cheery volunteer handed me my bibs-- one with a chip and number, and another mostly blank-- she instructed me to fill out the second bib with something I was grateful for and wear it on my back. Having already lost all feeling in my extremities from the cold, I wrote "MY FEET!" in the blank space, hoping that some positive thinking might revive them before they had to pound the pavement.

Looking for something to do that involved any kind of movement, I scuttled over to the awards able to look at the totally killer, ridiculously huge Turkeython medal that would be mine in another hour. It was love at first gobble. A large, full-color, turkey-shaped, heavyweight medal on a screen-printed ribbon-- these are the details that win my devotion.

At 8:00 AM, the first wave of the fastest runners was released to begin either two or four laps around Washington Square for the 5 or 10k. Normally I'm a huge fan of the wave start, but when there are only a couple hundred people and you have an entire parking lot to run through, there's no need for that amount of fuss. The emcee had told us to line up in the corral in terms of our pace, and as a traditionally 11:30-12:45 run-walk pacer, I had put myself decently far back in the corral. After the second, tiny wave was released, I realized that this self-proclaimed polar bear runner was going to be cold for an awful long time. When my turn finally came, I felt like I was literally bursting free from the gates. My entire body was frozen through and my feet were so numb I felt like I was running on nubs.

The 2013 Oregon Turkeython finisher medal.

After one full 1.55 mile lap, my core finally warmed up, but my legs still throbbed from the cold. Normally I run-walk, but today it was too cold to think, too cold to walk-- too cold to do anything but run, even on the solo incline of the otherwise flat, fast course. As I crossed the finish line, the feeling finally came back into my feet, and I learned that my chilly, Saucony-girdled feet had carried me to my very first sub-60 10k. It smashed my 2011 PR by almost six minutes and my most recent 10k in the coastal sand dunes by fourteen minutes, leaving me all smiles and celebration the rest of the day. Maybe I'm not such a Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Runner after all. Check out your own results here and reasonably priced ($5) photos from the event here.

UPDATED, 11/29/13, 8:09 PM: The original version of this recap stated that 231 runners and walkers finished the race. Actually, there were 231 finishers in the 10k; 500 in the 5k; 100 in the 2.5k; forty-one teams in the relay, with 4-5 people per team; and seventy-five children in the North Pole Kids Run.

Anne Milligan lives and runs in Northwest Portland. Friend her on Nike+, follow the official Run Oregon Instagram feed which features readers' photos and inspiration, or read her monthly column, "The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Runner" the first Monday of every month.